CHAPTER XXIV
THE MAKING OP A PLAYER
Master Will Shakspere was in town! The thought ran through NickAttwood's head like a half-remembered tune. Once or twice he had all butsung it instead of the words of his part. Master Will Shakspere wasin town!
Could he but just find Master Shakspere, all his trouble would be over;for the husband of his mother's own cousin would see justice done him inspite of the master-player and the bandy-legged man with the ribbon inhis ear--of that he was sure.
But there seemed small chance of its coming about; for the doors ofGaston Carew's house were locked and barred by day and by night, as muchto keep Nick in as to keep thieves out; and all day long, when Carew wasaway, the servants went about the lower halls, and Gregory Goole'suncanny face peered after him from every shadowy corner; and when hewent with Carew anywhere, the master-player watched him like a hawk,while always at his heels he could hear the clump, clump, clump of thebandy-legged man following after him.
Even were he free to go as he pleased, he knew not where to turn; forthe Lord Chamberlain's company would not be at the Blackfriarsplay-house until Martinmas; and before that time to look for even MasterWill Shakspere at random in London town would be worse than hunting fora needle in a haystack.
To be sure, he knew that the Lord Chamberlain's men were still playingat the theater in Shoreditch; for Master Carew had taken Cicely there tosee the "Two Gentlemen of Verona." But just where Shoreditch was, Nickhad only the faintest idea--somewhere away off by Finsbury Fields,beyond the city walls to the north of London town--and all the wideworld seemed north of London town; and the way thither lay through abewildering tangle of streets in which the din and the rush of the crowdwere never still.
From a hopeless chase like that Nick shrank back like a snail into itsshell. He was not too young to know that there were worse things than tobe locked in Gaston Carew's house. It were better to be a safe-keptprisoner there than to be lost in the sinks of London. And so, knowingthis, he made the best of it.
But Master Shakspere was come back to town, and that was something. Itseemed somehow less lonely just to think of it.
Yet in truth he had but little time to think of it; for themaster-player kept him closely at his strange, new work, and taught himdaily with the most amazing patience.
"NOBODY BREAKS NOBODY'S HEARTS IN OLD JO-OHN SMITHSESSHO-OP,' DRAWLED THE SMITH, IN HIS DEEP VOICE; NOR STEALSNOBODY, NOTHER"]
He had Nick learn no end of stage parts off by heart, with their cuesand "business," entrances and exits; and worked fully as hard as hispupil, reading over every sentence twenty times until Nick had theaccent perfectly. He would have him stamp, too, and turn about, andgesture in accordance with the speech, until the boy's arms ached, goingwith him through the motions one by one, over and over again,unsatisfied, but patient to the last, until Nick wondered. "Nick, mylad," he would often say, with a tired but determined smile, "one littlething done wrong may spoil the finest play, as one bad apple rots thebarrelful. We'll have it right, or not at all, if it takes a monthof Sundays."
So, often, he kept Nick before a mirror for an hour at a time, makingfaces while he spoke his lines, smiling, frowning, or grimacing as bestseemed to fit the part, until the boy grew fairly weary of his ownlooks. Then sometimes, more often as the time slipped by, Carew wouldclap his hands with a boyish laugh, and have a pie brought and a cup ofSpanish cordial for them both, declaring that he loved the lad with allhis heart, upon the remnant of his honour: from which Nick knew that hewas coming on.
Cicely Carew's governess was a Mistress Agnes Anstey. By birth she hadbeen a Harcourt of Ankerwyke, and she was therefore everywhere esteemedfit by birth and breeding to teach the young mind when to bow and whento beckon. She came each morning to the house, and Carew paid her doubleshillings to see to it that Nick learned such little tricks of cap andcloak as a lady's page need have, the carriage best fitted for hisplace, and how to come into a room where great folks were. Moreover, howto back out again, bowing, and not fall over the stools--which was nolittle art, until Nick caught the knack of peeping slyly between hislegs when he bowed.
His hair, too, was allowed to grow long, and was combed carefully everyday by the tiring-woman; and soon, as it was naturally curly, it fell inrolling waves about his neck.
On the heels of the governess came M'sieu de Fleury, who, it was said,had been dancing-master to Hatton, the late Lord Chancellor of England,and had taught him those tricks with his nimble heels which had caperedhim into the Queen's good graces, and so got him the chancellorship.M'sieu spoke dreadful English, but danced like the essence of agility,and taught both Nick and Cicely the latest Italian coranto, playing thetune upon his queer little pochette.
Cicely already danced like a pixy, and laughed merrily at her comrade'sfirst awkward antics, until he flushed with embarrassment. At that sheinstantly became grave, and, when M'sieu had gone, came across the room,and putting her arm about Nick, said repentantly, "Don't thou mind me,Nick. Father saith the French all laugh too soon at nothing; and I havecaught it from my mother's blood. A boy is not good friends with hisfeet as a girl is; but thou wilt do beautifully, I know; and M'sieushall teach us the galliard together."
And often, after the lesson was over and M'sieu departed, she wouldhave Nick try his steps over and over again in the great room, while shestood upon the stool to make her tall, and cried, "Sa--sa!" as themaster did, scolding and praising him by turns, or jumping down inpretty impatience to tuck up her little silken skirts and show him thestep herself; while the cook's knave and the scullery-maids peeped atthe door and cried: "La, now, look 'e, Moll!" at every coupee.
It made a picture quaint and pretty to see them dancing there. The smokylight, stealing in through the narrow casements over the woodwork darkwith age, dropped in little yellow chequers upon old chests of oak, ofwalnut, and of strange, purple-black wood from foreign lands, giving aweird life to the griffins and twisted traceries carved upon theirsides. High-backed, narrow chairs stood along the wall, with cushionedstools inlaid with shell. Twinklings of light glinted from the brasscandlesticks. On the wall above the wainscot the faded hangings waveredin the draught, crusted thickly with strange embroidered flowers. Anddancing there together in the semi-gloom, the children seemed quaintlittle figures stepped down from the tapestry at the touch of amagic wand.
And so the time went slipping by, very pleasantly upon the whole, andNick's young heart grew stout again within his breast; for he was strongand well, and in those days the very air was full of hope, and no manknew what might betide with the rising of to-morrow's sun.
Every day, from two till three o'clock, he was at Master Gyles'sprivate singing-room at the old cathedral school, learning to read musicat first sight, and to sing offhand the second, third, and fourth partsof queer intermingled fugues or wonderfully constructed canons.
At first his head felt stuffed like a feasted glutton with all thelearning that the old precentor poured into it; but by and by he foundit plain enough, and no very difficult thing to follow up the prickingsin the paper with his voice, and to sing parts written at fifths andfourths and thirds with other voices as easily as to carry a song alone.But still he sang best his own unpointed songs, the call and challengeof the throstle and the merle, the morning glory of the lark, songs thatwere impossible to write. And those were the songs that the precentorwas at the greatest pains to have him sing in perfect tones, making himopen his mouth like a little round and let the music float outof itself.
Like the master-player, nothing short of perfection pleased oldNathaniel Gyles, and Nick's voice often wavered with sheer weariness ashe ran his endless scales and sang absurd fa-la-la-las while his teacherbeat the time in the air with his lean forefinger like a grim automaton.
The old man, too, was chary of his praise, though Nick tried hard toplease him, and it was only by little things he told his satisfaction.He touzed the ears of the other boys, and sometimes smartly thumpedtheir crowns; but with Nick he only nip
ped his ruddy cheek between histhumb and finger, or laid his hand upon his shoulder when the hard day'swork was done, saying, "_Satis cantorum_--it is enough. Now be off tothy nest, sir; and do not forget to wash thy throat with good cold waterevery day."
* * * * *
All this time the busy sand kept running in the glass. July was gone,and August at its heels. The hot breath of the summer had cooled, andthe sun no longer burned the face when it came in through the windows.Nick often shut his eyes and let the warm light fall upon his closedlids. It made a ruddy glow like the wild red poppies that grow in thepale green rye. In fancy he could almost smell the queer, rancid odor ofthe crimson bloom crushed beneath the feet of the farmers' boys who cutthe butter-yellow mustard from among the bearded grain.
"Heigh-ho and alackaday!" thought Nick. "It is better in the countrythan in town!" For there was no smell in all the town like the clean,sweet smell of the open fields just after a summer rain, no colors likethe bright heart's-ease and none-so-pretty, or the honeysuckle over thecottage door, and no song ever to be heard among the sooty chimney-potslike the song of the throstle piping to the daisies on the hill.
But he had little time to dream such dreams, for every day from four tosix o'clock the children's company played and sang in public, at theirown school-hall, or in the courtyard of the Mitre Inn on Bread streetnear St. Paul's.
They were the pets of London town, and their playing-place was throngedday after day. For the bright young faces and sweet, unbroken voices ofthe richly costumed lads made a spot in sordid London life like a pot ofposies in a window on a dark street; so that both the high and the low,the rich and the poor, came in to see them play and dance, to hear themsing, and to laugh again at the witty things which were written forthem to say.
The songs that were set for Nick to sing were always short, sweet,simple things that even the dull-eyed, toil-worn folk upon the roughplank benches in the pit could understand. Many a silver shilling cameclinking down at the heels of the other boys from the galleries of theinn, where the people of the better classes, wealthy merchants, ladiesand their dashing gallants, watched the children's company; but whenNick's songs were done the common people down below seemed all gonedaft. They tossed red apples after him, ripe yellow pears, fat purpleplums by handfuls, called him by name and brought him back, and criedfor more and more and more, until the old precentor shook his headbehind the prompters-screen, and waved Nick off with a forbidding frown.Yet all the while he chuckled to himself until it seemed as if his dryold ribs would rattle in his sides; and every day, before Nick sang, hehad him up to his little room for a broken egg and a cup ofrosy cordial.
"To clear thy voice and to cheer the cockles of thine heart," said he;"and to tune that pretty throat of thine _ad gustum Reginae_--which isto say, 'to the Queen's own taste,'--God bless Her Majesty!"
The other boys were cast for women's parts, for women never acted then;and a queer sight it was to Nick to see his fellows in greatfarthingales of taffeta and starchy cambric that rustled as theywalked, with popinjay blue ribbon in their hair, and flowered stomacherssparkling with paste jewels.
And, truth, it was no easy thing to tell them from the real affair, orto guess the made from the maiden, so slender and so graceful were theyall, with their ruffs and their muffs and their feathered fans, and allthe airs and mincing graces of the daintiest young miss.
But old Nat Gyles would never have Nick Attwood play the girl. "The ladis good enough for me just as he is," said he; and that was all therewas of it.